NBCNBC's coverage of the Summer Olympics will be captained by host Bob Costas.

TV PREVIEW

Summer Olympics

What and when: NBC coverage of the London Olympics begins with preliminary soccer matches at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday on NBC Sports Network. The opening ceremony, including the traditional Parade of Nations and a per formance by Paul McCartney, airs at 7:30 p.m. Friday on WKYC Channel 3. The closing ceremony is Sunday, Aug. 12.

Numbers tell the story at Olympic events. How fast? How high? How far? How many medals were won by individuals and countries?

NBC will be setting some world records of its own with coverage of the London Olympics. Led by Bob Costas, the network's team boasts 115 expert commentators. That's a record.

The roster includes 28 Olympians whose combined medal count is 45. Joined by such veteran broadcasters as Al Michaels and Dan Patrick, they will present 5,535 hours of coverage on NBC, five NBCUniversal cable channels, an Internet site, two specialty channels and the first-ever 3D platform for an Olympics. That's a record, surpassing coverage of the 2008 Beijing Olympics by 2,000 hours.

And, for the first time, every event will be streamed live, at NBCOlympics.com.

But these numbers, as impressive as they are, only tell part of the story. Other questions and other numbers will define the London Olympics for NBC. How much money can the beleaguered network make from this coverage? How many viewers will these Summer Games attract? How strong a promotional platform will it be for new and returning fall series?

That last question goes to the aching heart of why Friday night's opening ceremony for the London Olympics can't march into full-pageant view fast enough for NBC. The once-golden network owned by Comcast Corp is lagging in fourth place, behind CBS, Fox and ABC.

So, if scripted prime-time programming were an Olympic event, NBC wouldn't even win a bronze medal. Lumbering through the 2011-12 season like a heavyweight wrestler entered in the 400-meter hurdles, the ratings-challenged Peacock Network couldn't place one comedy or drama in Nielsen's top 40.

Sports programming, though, is one of the few arenas where NBC has something to cheer about these days. "Sunday Night Football" is TV's highest-rated prime-time series, and the struggling network is looking for that badly needed Olympian boost in London.

More coverage

Get full Olympics coverage during the Games, including blogs, Tweets and video with Doug Lesmerises and Tim Warsinskey in London. Plus you'll find breaking news, updated medal count, a TV schedule, photo galleries, video and more at cleveland.com/olympics

Still, while the Olympic torch is a bright symbol of hope for NBC, there are significant programming challenges and risks presented by these Games. Start with all that online streaming at NBCOlympics.com.

"The decision was made because we think that, as times have changed, there is a sense to satisfy all people using technology," NBC Sports Group chairman Mark Lazarus told a group of sports journalists and TV critics in late June. "In the past, maybe the technology wasn't there to support that."

It's a huge gamble. Too much live streaming could take some of the programming punch out of what's being offered on NBC's prime-time lineup. Lazarus believes effective storytelling will offset that in prime time.

"We also believe firmly that to package and put together the best stories with the most high profile, events should be saved, from a television point of view, for when the most people are available to watch it, which is in prime time," Lazarus said. "We think that the streaming during the day will help drive people to prime time."

The Beijing Games attracted about 214 million viewers, according to Nielsen, and part of the reason was that the time difference allowed for many live prime-time events for Americans. NBC also didn't stream the showcase events during the Beijing Olympics.

"The extreme time difference worked to our advantage, because they were willing to stage those races in the late morning in Beijing, which made them live in prime time," Costas said. "It was a perfect scenario."

But the time difference doesn't work nearly as well in London. Almost no events will be held when the most number of people will be watching in America, so NBC is conceding that the viewership record probably won't be broken in this summer.

Also, economically, NBC's Olympic strategy is more of a marathon than a sprint. The $900 million NBC paid for rights to cover the Beijing Olympics was money well spent. The network racked up well more than $1 billion in advertising revenue.

NBC paid $2.2 billion for the rights to the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games and the London Olympics. It lost $220 million on the Vancouver Olympics, and the London operation is facing some tough budget obstacles.

But NBCUniversal executives believe its new Olympic contract will yield long-term profits. They paid $4.38 billion for the rights to the four upcoming Olympics.

"We wanted to make sure that we got the Games at a price that would not cause this company every two years to lose a lot of money, and we believe we've done that," said Steve Burke, NBCUniversal's chief executive. "The way to think about the four future Games is, we get those at the same price that we get London . . . but unlike other sports where there are very, very large increases in rights fees when they get renewed, we got a chance to get four more Games at roughly the same price. So these properties become more and more valuable in a world that is increasingly fragmented."

NBC also will use the Olympics to promote the "Today" show, "NBC Nightly News," Jimmy Fallon's late-night program and its fall series. Expect plenty of spots extolling the virtues of such rookie shows as the comedy "Animal Practice" and J.J. Abrams' futuristic drama, "Revolution."

"We think it's a good platform for NBCUniversal to talk about other parts our company," Lazarus said. "You will definitely see other shows, other services, whether they're cable services or theme parks or other things, promoted during the Games."

Follow Us

cleveland.com is powered by Plain Dealer Publishing Co. and Northeast Ohio Media Group. All rights reserved (About Us).The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Northeast Ohio Media Group LLC.